Nashville's Bridgestone Arena raking in more sellout events

Arena ranks among top U.S. venues for ticket sales

Jul. 17, 2013

Already this year, Bridgestone Arena has hosted 11 sold-out events — not counting the Predators hockey games — with such acts as Beyonce, who brought her 'Mrs. Carter Show World Tour 2013' to town on Saturday. Robin Harper / Invision for Parkwood Entertainment / AP Images

Written by

Heidi Hall

The Tennessean

The group One Direction played before a packed house at Bridgestone Arena last month. Early successes launched Bridgestone to its No. 7 midyear slot on Pollstar's top U.S. venues for ticket sales. / Sanford Myers / File / The Tennessean

Packing the Bridgestone Arena used to have a little more cachet — before it started happening all the time.

Already this year, the downtown Nashville venue has hosted 11 sold-out events — not counting the Predators hockey games — with acts as diverse as Pink, Eric Clapton, The Black Keys, One Direction and Beyonce performing within weeks of each other.

Early successes launched Bridgestone to its No. 7 midyear slot on Pollstar’s top U.S. venues for ticket sales, released Tuesday by the arena — a far cry from its No. 23 ranking this time in 2010.

That improvement took a lot of hard work by the city and arena management, said Sean Henry, president and chief operating officer of the Nashville Predators and Bridgestone Arena. It started with a 2007 deal granting the Predators front office, which manages the venue, incentives for booking non-hockey events.

It prompts the team to work its National Hockey League schedule around good concert nights, advertise concerts during hockey games and use a 250,000-address email list to promote upcoming shows, Henry said.

He said a turning point was Garth Brooks’ nine sold-out shows in December 2010 to raise money for flood relief.

“That showed the music industry that Nashville isn’t a good small market, it’s a market that can sell out show after show after show,” Henry said. “Up until that time, people weren’t sure about that.”

The team collected the maximum $2 million in non-hockey incentives alone for fiscal year 2012, said Bob Lackey, special projects manager for Metro Nashville’s finance department. The max for fiscal year 2013, which just ended, is $2.7 million, but it’s unclear yet whether the team will hit that mark.

Concert bookers said the venue is a hot one for reasons other than promotion. Nashville’s an easy market for fans to travel to, it’s a popular, growing city and there’s no other choice in Bridgestone’s size range since the Starwood Amphitheatre closed in 2007, said Ali Harnell, senior vice president of AEG Live.

“Bridgestone is a fantastic building,” she said. “Great capacity, great staff, great fans.”

All those things attracted Tampa security company owner Shannon Schofield to see Beyonce in Nashville instead of closer to home.

“It was so much less expensive, and we enjoyed being on the town in Nashville, too,” Schofield said. “We loved the convenience of Bridgestone. We could stay at a place downtown, enjoy Broadway, see some of the sights and not have to drive around much.”